1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to computer networks, and more particularly, to enabling network-capable computers to communicate with and to administer storage devices over a network without the need for additional hardware.
2. Description of the Background Art
Many conventional client computers access storage systems over a communications network. Similarly, many conventional client computer systems allow remote file systems to appear as though they were a part of the client's file system. Such systems permit data sharing of storage capacity among computers and servers of various operating systems. Conventional approaches, however, suffer from the drawback that the physical disk drives that store the information shared over the network are owned by the server computer (and not by the client computer). As a result, conventional technologies do not allow a client computer to completely own and manage the physical disk drives. For example, conventional techniques do not enable the client computer to format, partition, and access the physical storage devices as block devices.
In addition, implementing “raw” disk I/O over a network can take several seconds. Conventionally, computers expect a relatively fast response from their respective storage devices. If a client (initiator) computer is expecting data I/O to proceed at disk speeds, this network latency can be problematic, since certain network protocols, such as TCP/IP, do not guarantee response times and can take many seconds to complete a single I/O operation.
As the number and variety of interconnected devices and systems have continued to increase in recent years, users have recognized the advantages of having a variety of devices available for use on their storage systems. One example of a storage system is a SAN (Storage Area Network), which is a high-speed network of storage devices that transfers data among computer systems and storage elements.
Conventionally, small computing devices lack the specialized hardware (such as Fibre Channel hardware) that would enable them to connect to certain types of storage systems, such as a SAN. This deficiency is often due to the absence of internal “real estate” for additional adapter boards or to the cost-prohibited expense of the Fibre Channel hardware.
What is needed is a way to allow standard computers to access, manage, and control storage across a network without needing specialized hardware of dedicated lines, while still maintaining acceptable network latency and access rates. It is also desirable to solve the problem of network latency when storing and retrieving data across a network.